The Weekend and Beyond

Here are some suggestions for your weekend travels and the rest of December.

Avoid Wilson Bridge
If all goes according to plan, drivers should avoid the outer loop near the bridge from 9 o'clock tonight through Sunday evening. This is the first of two weekends during which workers will set up the new Thru lanes on the bridge. At the end of the weekend, drivers should be able to use those two new lanes on the outer loop. Then next weekend, the ones on the inner loop will open.

But first, the weekend delays starting tonight:
-- The outer loop will be reduced from three lanes to one from east of Van Dorn Street in Virginia through east of Route 210 in Maryland. (See map.)
-- At the Springfield interchange, traffic will be diverted toward the inner loop and the American Legion Bridge.
-- The ramp from Route 1 South to the outer loop will be closed.
-- One lane on the inner loop will be closed for storm sewer work.

Metrorail Delays
A switch replacement project at Friendship Heights on the Red Line and track maintenance between Vienna and West Falls Church on the Orange Line will create delays up to half an hour this weekend as trains share a single track to get around the work zones. See the full details here.

Georgetown Merriment on Sunday
One block of Wisconsin Avenue between M and N streets NW will be closed Sunday for the Merriment in Georgetown holiday celebration from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. and vehicles will be detoured.

Merriment in Georgetown runs from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. To reach the event, try the Circulator bus, which runs about every 10 minutes between Union Station and Georgetown, or the Georgetown Metro Connection, which links Georgetown with the Rosslyn and Dupont Circle Metro stations.

Note that the closed block messes with the upper part of the Circulator route. During the closure, there won't be any service on Wisconsin north of M Street. Metro will detour Routes 32 and 36 around the block.

Beltway Bridge Demolition
Nighttime bridge demolition will continue for about a month on the Lee Highway overpass at the Capital Beltway. Two lanes on each loop are closed from 9:30 p.m. to 5 a.m.

Arlington Boulevard
The left lanes in each direction under the Capital Beltway will be closed for about four months so workers can build new bridge piers. The two right through-lanes will be open in each direction. When the new piers are done, the left lanes on the boulevard will reopen.

Toys at Union Station
Amtrak and the Toys For Tots program will be accepting new, unwrapped toys as well as cash donations at Union Station Gate A on Wednesday Dec. 10 from 5:30 to 11 a.m. and from 3 to 6 p.m.

Maryland Road Study
Maryland is deciding what transportation improvements to make along Norbeck and Spencerville roads between Georgia Avenue and Interstate 95 in Prince George's and Montgomery counties.

The project manager for this corridor study is Shawn Burnett, who can be reached at 410-545-8531 or 800-548-5026.

D.C. Transit Plans
The District Department of Transportation and Metro this month will show the preliminary findings of their Neighborhood Circulation StudyÖ, reviewing potential improvements in bus services.

The District says the improvements could include new Metrobus lines and new Circulator buses or changes to existing routes.

This is the schedule of four December meetings, all of which begin at 6:30 p.m. with an open house and continue at 7 p.m. with a presentation: Tuesday, Trinidad Recreation Center, 1310 Childress St. NE; Wednesday, 6th District Police Station, 100 42nd Street NE; Thursday, Trinity AME Zion Church, 3505 16th Street NW; Dec. 16, The Specialty Hospital of Washington-Hadley, 4601 Martin L. King Jr. Ave. SW.

11th Street SW Bridge Project
The District has closed one of the eastbound lanes of D Street SW until April part of the 11th Street Bridge rehabilitation project. This portion of the work will fix the concrete abutment on the southeast side of the bridge.
One eastbound and one westbound lane of D Street will remain open to traffic. The sidewalk on the south side will be closed.

Silver Spring Intersection Widening
Avoid the busy intersection at University Boulevard and Piney Branch Road this weekend, while the Maryland State Highway Administration starts a project to widen it.

Starting at 9 a.m. Friday, the Maryland State Highway Administration will close the right lane along eastbound University between Glenville Road and Gilbert Road. It also will close the right lane along southbound Piney Branch Road between Carroll Avenue and Unversity. The closures will continue till 3 p.m. Saturday, if all goes on schedule.

Flower Avenue and Carroll Avenue are among the alternative routes around the congestion that's likely to result this weekend.

Yeh, DC uses some confusing terminology in reference to those roads and ramps in Southwest. Instead of "11th Street Bridge" if they said "the ramp to the 12th Street Tunnel" it would be a heck of a lot clearer.

My gut tells me the Wilson Bridge project will get postponed due to it being too cold and due to the forecast for precipitation. I rode the Yellow Line roundtrip from Huntington to downtown today and it looks like everything's ready except for finalizing the striping at the split and for hanging the signs (which should have been done in advance so that they could just uncover them).

Dr. G, the link to the full details on metro rail delays in this post is broken, probably due to the launch of the new metro website. Was this the last weekend in Dec. for delays on the redline? Waiting for a train outside on a platform at Twinbrook wasn't fun yesterday. Brrr.

While we are reintroducing ourselves...I was formerly Laura on this blog.

Thought Metro handled the Medical Center-Van Ness delays well. Service advisories were posted and operators clearly explained the delay.
However, there were serious problems getting on a train. On three separate occasions, including immediately after the decently-attended BB&T Classic last night, wait times from downtown to the suburbs were over 20 minutes.